Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1887-09-02

two hay-stacks and then the gundelOws
went down the river for the salt hay, and
came back, days afterward, with their dark
square sails set atop of the square loads Of
thatch and one by one all the concerns Of
ripening and harvesting had their season,
and passed, and August was over And
Mark had never once been up the lane,
and September had gone, and the harvest
moon and the hunters moon had poured
its silver floods of light out Of great lone
ly heaven and still Mark had never come.
/ suppose Mrs Wells, my next neighbor,
knew all about it. And Mrs. Sawyer, on
the other side, Of course knew all that Mrs.
Wells did. They were very good to me,
and they and the girls were always run
ming in TO see me, or sending for me TO run
in and see them | don't think | was try
ing TO carry things off with a high hand,
and | know | wasn't hanging my head and
crying over what was not TO be helped
| simply made my mind to the inevitable.
| was never going TO have Mark beside me
any more, and must endure it, and get
through life as well as | could | had this
farm on my hands, and all the people who
had their living from it, and | must do my
duty. And perhaps in time fate would be
kinder, and give me fever or a cough,
and let me lie down and die and he would
come then and look on me, and remember
how had loved him, and be sorry And
thinking how sorry he would be was a joy
hugged to my heart, and the only joy |
had.
But used TO long so sometimes to see
Marks dear face again. to hear his voice,
just 10 lay my head on his shoulder and cry
my eyes out there Sometimes it used to
seem to me that ! couldn't live another
minute if didn't run down that lane and
up through the wood to the old house on
the rock and find him, and beg him to for
give me-forgive, oh, not Just that burst
Of temper, but the whole rebellion of my
soul-and come back TO me and sometimes
| felt that | must take some sleeping potion
that would keep me benumbed till the pain
had passed, or else must throw myself into
the river always running by, brimmed and
shining and Indifferent
And | began TO hate the river-the river
that had used 10 love 50 in the sunshine,
all blue and silver that had loved so,
dimpling in its soft grays in rainy weather
where | had never tired Of seeing the ice
boats dart along when it lay white under
its wintry mail-the river that now, in my
grief and trouble and WEAKNESS, flowed
past as calmly as if | had never seen it.
How could it be SO irresponsve, rolling on
back no sympathy now in my sorrOwful
mood, giving me even no vantage-ground
for | should have had to wade into it if
| had wanted to drown myself. Yes, be-
gan TO hate the river. | began to hate, too,
these long, tircsome motioness levels of
the grass land-oh, so flat. so monotonous,
so low "One is simply underground here,
/ said to myself "One has really not the
air to breathe. One becomes like those
slugs that live under the damp side of IA
stone | am under "A stone myself. Oh,
for just breath Of air from some point
little way up the sky - | began to hate, |
say, the long green grass fields; and then
| began to hate the farm life. 1T is dull,
sordid, base work, let them say what they
| please, | said from the pitching about of
the barn yard muck to the last results Of
| it. 1t is all nonsense about its being the
one noble occupation SO is the cooks,
then, too And hated the great cattle
in the yard, the smell of the frothing pals
of milk, the click of the stanchions, the
cheese making, the butter -packing-every
thing that belonged to all the dull round Of
the farm duties. ] went about to see the
work done, and said word TO the maids
| here, the men there and | went and sat
down by my kindling autumn fire, and felt
| that if had to live here forever, had bet
ter die and be done with it. | had rather
die and be done with it anyway, if | was
never 10 see Mark any more but then that
was no new feeling.
Do what | would, my thoughts would
follow Mark. Was he there alone in his
fathers house Was he riding gayly round
the country, visiting other houses, other
girls happier than l, hearing music, joining
in laughter Or was he travelling off in
| distant regions, seeing new sights and for
| getting the old, forgetting the past and me
| in fresh experiences Or was he sitting at
| home there in the long dim room whose
windows looked through the pine wood Wis
| Ia over the broad valley and away to blue
mountains No one told me no one ever
ventured to mention his name to me. But
somehow my fancy placed him there in the
| long dim room and there my fancy kept
following him and lowering about him.
| Now he sat by the ireside there, in the
deep chair, reading now he was busy with
maps and pictures at the table now, in
| the big bay, the moonlight that had pale
| green reflections in it cast up from the EN-
erald depths Of the woods below, fell about
him. | dare say that, in reality, busy
about the place and his affairs Of one sort
| or another, and doing his best TO live and
to forget, he was very little in that room ;
but there | chose to place him and it grew
strangely sweet to me, and every moment
when | could sit down alone my fancy took
me and | sat down in that room, or else |
wandered up and down the great staircase
and the hall where his peoples portraits
hung but | always came back again to
the hearth of the long dim room if it were
day, to the dancing fire-cast shadows there
if it were night, and the place grew dear
I 4 I
braided myself in thoughts too bitter for
| speech for the folly and angry temper that
had shut me out of it, that had drawn COM
parison between that ancient lofty place
| and this low and tiresome stretch of moth
ing but common grass lands, between that
manor and this plain farmhouse, although
in real truth my farm house was quite its
| equal at any other time. But the new year
| came in without a sign from Mark or a sign
from me and the country was white with
snow and the river ice was strong enough
to bear up sledges and teams of horses and
the ice-boats were splitting the wind before
them. 1t all made no odds to me. was
completely wretched. | didn't pretend TO
go TO church or to any of the society meet
ings and if the Sawyers and Wellses came
to me, | suppose treated them properly
I'm sure | don't know-but | never set my
| 1901 outdoors tne winter long.
There were furious storms that winter.
The snow fell as | never remembered it be-
fore The drifts seemed to wall us in from
all the world. "A living tomb, l used to
murmur. Il wish it were a tomb indeed,
and | in my last sleep" At twenty, one
can be so very miserable and at thirty, if
one lives so long, one can be so profane as
to laugh at it,
Sometimes Bryan and Thomas brought
word of the outside regions Of the way
people up-river were sleigh riding over the
tops of fences, Of the immense snowfall in
the mountains, and the fears of what would
happen from it in the spring if there should
be an early thaw. And / remembered some
words that Mark used to quote from play
he had seen, "When this snow melteth
there shall come flood" didn't care
how many floods came
And so, with storm after storm, the win
ter wore away Jane and Maria at their
home keeping tasks and busy with my
rug-making, hooking strips of woolen cloth
through coffee bags, not because the house
was not full of them, but because | had
nothing better TO do. For couldn't read
if / tried my eyes swan, and l couldn't
make out word of what it was all about
And people went and came like shadows
and the days had grown short, and now
they grew long, and what did it all matter
| TO me
March had come, but without sign of the
winters breaking and then at last April
loiltered on, and April suns began to dc
their work aud gradually the drifts OF
snow in the lanes and in the fields began tC
settle, and to lessen and melt and disappear
And Bryan and Thomas had TO talk Of the
brooding hens, and watch for the breaking
up of the river, and discuss the chance Of
the early rye and the new calves and the
hiring of the spring hands, and it was al
emptiness. And one day it began to snow
and the snow turned TO rain, and it rained
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